When Karen gave the advice, “stop acting like a grad student,” she was working from a model grad student in her mind who, it turns out when she gave it a bit more thought, was a white male. In today’s episode, Karen and Kel dig into that normative model, and talk about all the ways that the advice on how a job seeker “needs to act” needs to be complicated to account for people who come from different subject positions and are viewed through different racist lenses. Advice about “thinking your department is out to get you” for example, needs to reflect that for many grad students of color, the department really is out to get you.
The academy despises the IDEA of self-promotion while rewarding those who do it in properly academic ways. This is just one of the many classist elements of academia. Those who decide to leave the academy need to face and overcome the shaming around self-promotion. In this episode, Karen and Kel tell you how, with special attention to LinkedIn. We get it, it feels yucky at first. But LinkedIn is no different than your academic cover letter–it puts your skills and aptitudes out there, for potential employers. Don’t hesitate to use it, and more importantly, don’t allow yourself to be stymied and quelled by elitist academic value judgments – others’ and your own. ...
This episode, recorded prior to the pandemic, delves into coping with the inevitable disappointments of the academic life, whether it’s the job, or the grant, or the publication… or the whole career that just didn’t pan out. The first of a two-part series, it introduces six tools for managing disappointment in ways that academia never teaches us. The tools: 1) Face the facts, feel the feelings; 2) You are not a failure and you are not your job; 3) Learn from this experience (ie, process not outcome); 4) Give yourself credit for trying; 5) Refocus on what you DO have and what DOES work; 6) Sharing the experience with (genuine) supporters. Along the way Karen and Kel also talk about white entitlement, concrete ways to ask for feedback, negativity bias, saber-tooth tigers; the scarcity mentality of academia, and Buddhist and Jewish inspirations. [Become a subscribing member for just $3.99 a month and get access to our subscriber only goodies like free webinar recordings, AMAs, the chance to suggest topics, early access to the podcast video that we record in our house in Oregon, and — new from this week – live videos with Karen and Kel on Friday mornings, all on our dedicated podcast member page on Mighty Networks! Not ready to subscribe? Donate here to send along some support–it goes straight to the production team!] ...
We continue with the three-part examination of getting stuck and unstuck. Last week we talked about the Island of Perfectionism. Today we talk the Sea of Change (next week, we talk the Quagmire of Failure). The individualism of the (American) academy puts all responsibility for struggle on the individual. But we remind you, you didn’t just “fall” off your path–in the words of Dr. Roxanne Donovan of The Well Academic, something pushed you off. The pandemic and the Great Resignation are currently pushing unprecedented numbers of academics (especially women) off their planned path. But change is scary! And academics are profoundly risk-averse. We talk about turning toward a mindset of process not outcome (“‘to be’ is not the question in the Sea of Change,” quoth Karen), and querying the conviction of “nobility” that so many academics attach to the academic enterprise and that keeps people stuck in untenable academic places – exploited, endangered, miserable. Pushing the sea-metaphor way past its likely utility (!), Karen and Kel talk about befriending the fear, setting out on your little dinghy – maybe with some help pulling it past the break* – and paddling out into unknown waters! *Like the new Art of Leaving program, which starts next month! And the Professor Is Out private FB group.) [Become a subscribing member for just $3.99 a month and get access to our subscriber only goodies like free webinar recordings, AMAs, the chance ...
